Reaction from the Chamber of Bakers to the change in bread tariff: ‘There will be chaos’

Ankara Bakers’ Chamber President Gürsel Alnıaçık noted that an amendment was made to Article 5 of the Regulation on Price Tariffs for Goods and Services Produced by Tradesmen and Craftsmen with the regulation published in the Official Gazette.

Tariffs regarding the price of bagels and bread defined in the Turkish Food Codex Bread and Bread Types Communiqué of the new regulation made by the Confederation of Turkish Tradesmen and Craftsmen are determined by the relevant municipality, Provincial Directorate of Commerce, Provincial Directorate of Agriculture and Forestry, chamber of commerce and industry or chamber of commerce, respectively. It is approved by the Union after the evaluation of the commission consisting of representatives of the chamber and the positive opinion of the relevant federation and the Ministry of Commerce. However, if a negative opinion is given to the tariff requested by the Ministry, the Union submits the new tariff request, together with its justifications, to the opinion of the Ministry again without a commission meeting; Pointing out that “it will be approved after receiving the opinion”, Alnıaçık said that they had no information when this change was made.

“NO LEGAL BASIS”

Alnıaçık said, “When we were going to get a bread tariff, the chambers applied to the Union, the Union convened a commission, applied to the Ministry of Commerce, and the Ministry responded within 1 month. Now they have made changes with the approval of the Ministry, but in my opinion, this has no legal basis. “Then there is no need for chambers and unions,” he said.

Explaining that the opinion of the Ministry of Commerce was previously taken, Alnıaçık said, “Even though the opinion was negative, the decision taken by the Union was valid.”

Alnıaçık continued as follows:

“There is also politics in bread in Turkey. We buy all the inputs for bread from the free market, but bread is subject to tariffs. We buy flour, yeast, salt, natural gas from the free market. Tonight, diesel prices will increase by 1 lira and 20 kuruş. The 550 TL flour I bought 1 month ago is now 700 TL. You give a tariff for bread, how can I buy flour from the free market and then apply the tariff? They should also subject the inputs of bread to the tariff.

They lost all its taste and salt. We put money from our pocket and bake bread. “If they try to block our tariff, there will be chaos in Ankara, there will be no bread, we will not be able to deliver bread to grocery stores and dealers.”